Er. Mahendra Raj breathed one’s last and left for his heavenly abode. It’s a great loss to the Engineering fraternity. He was a visionary known for his dynamic and noble personality. Post-Independence the industrial buildings, institutions, dams were the new age temples of the nation and putting together the building blocks were avant-garde like Sri. Mahendra Raj, who paved the foundation of modern India. He started his professional career with the structural designs of the buildings designed for the new capital city of Chandigarh.
He was appointed assistant engineer in the Punjab Public Works Department (PWD) in 1946 in Chandigarh, around the time Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru had invited Corbusier to design the city. Raj, along with a senior engineer, assisted Corbusier in building the Punjab and Haryana High Court and Secretariat, as part of Chandigarh’s Capitol Complex. In his long career, he has been associated with many iconic projects: from Le Corbusier’s sculptural high court in Chandigarh to BV Doshi’s Tagore Memorial Hall, Ahmedabad, and Raj Rewal’s Hall of Nations, Pragati Maidan, Delhi. Be it the truncated pyramid-like concrete shell roof at the Salvacao Church in Mumbai, the NDMC building in Delhi that stretches like a concrete cat towards the skies, or the cutting-edge airports in Hyderabad and Jaisalmer. Of the many landmark projects in India by him, perhaps the most significant one is the Hall of Nations (1971-72), a large span space frame enclosure constituted from thin concrete members.
Some of Er. Mahendra Raj projects are one of their kind, in India and the world, for instance, the Hall of Nations and Industries with their large-span cast-in-situ space frame and the Hindon River Mills with a series of bowstring arches in concrete. His practice also boasts of heroic structures built in the 60s and 70s such as the large folded-plate cantilevered structure in concrete for the Municipal Stadium in Ahmedabad, the folded-plate frame for Tagore Hall, the transfer girders that realised the architects’ needs for the New Great Insurance Co building and Akbar Hotel, all pioneering constructions in India. The 80s saw further innovative structures such as the zig-zag columns stabilised by corridors in the NCDC office and the use of Vierendeel trusses in the STC office building to create cantilevered large-span cascading forms.
Famous Projects Executed by Er. Mahendra Raj
- Municipal Stadium and Sports Complex, Ahmedabad (1962-65)
- Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (1964)
- Talkatora Indoor Stadium, New Delhi (1971-72)
- Indoor Sports Stadium, New Delhi (1979-82)
- Indian Embassy, Kuwait (1989-91)
- Centre for Science and Environment
- New Delhi (1992-93)
- Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai (1992-93)
- Salarjung Museum, Hyderabad (1995-96)
- Hyatt Regency, Goa (1999-2000)
- Lakeside Habitat View, Bengaluru (2004-05)
- Tahiliani Design Headquarters, Gurgaon(2006)
- Jaisalmer Airport, Rajasthan (2008-1011)
He also helped set up the Consultancy Development Centre with his effort in framing a legislation for the regulation of the profession of engineers has been unending. It resulted in the government establishing the Engineering Council of India in 2002. An active member in the International Federation of Consulting Engineers, he has many awards and recognitions to his name.
May his Soul Rest in Peace.
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